Summer School : "Renewable Energies and Building Technologies in the MENA region"

Between August 13 and August 24, 2013 the Summer School with the headline "Renewable Energies and Building Technologies in the MENA region" took place in Tunis, which was organized in cooperation with the Dresden University of Technology, the Ecole Nationale d'Ingénieurs de Tunis (ENIT) and the DESERTEC University Network (DUN). Within the workshop 24 students coming from Egypt, Tunisia and Germany engaged in energy questions of the building sector of the MENA region.

During the first program week the participants concentrated particularly on energy efficiency approaches. After an introduction into the concepts of passive design and zero-energy-buildings, the students have presented solution approaches that consider different climate and cultural conditions of the southern Mediterranean in the architecture.

The second program week mainly treated renewable energy applications such as photovoltaic, solar heat and solar cooling as well as geothermal energy in the building sector. In addition to the given theoretical background, the students had the opportunity to get insights into the practical work of the energetic laboratory of the ENIT and into industrial solar cooling applications.

One of the greatest challenges was the integration of students with different focuses since besides engineering students also architecture students participated at the summer school. However, very positive group dynamics have developed by showing an impressive mutual support. The participation and collaboration of the students was notably active and keen minded.

Many of the participants have left the Summer School with great motivation to go on dealing with renewable energies and building technology intensively. Some of the students have also shown a very deep interest in continuing their studies in Germany, wherefore a visit at the DAAD's Tunis office was very enriching. Particularly inspiring was also the intercultural curiosity between Tunisian and Egyptian participants that have lead to fascinating discussions of which also the German participants have learned a lot.

During the 12 days it was only possible to give an introduction into the treated topics. It would be interesting to organize a continuing event that focuses on selected topics allowing more technical depth. Moreover, this event was a successful start into a continuous relation between Dresden University of Technology and the Ecole Nationale d'Ingénieurs de Tunis.